This is a request for a 4-year program of research into the control of instrumental behavior--especially avoidance behaviors. This research will primarily utilize the "transfer of control" technique wherein control of behavior gets transferred to Pavlovian stimuli (CSs). The experiments will explore the effects of prior Pavlovian conditioning operations upon the acquisition, performance, and persistence of instrumental responding. Primary emphasis will be placed upon the elucidation of the mechanism(s) whereby the Pavlovian stimuli exert their control. Is this mediational mechanism one of mechanically interacting skeletal-motor responses, or is it a central mechanism? If the latter, does the mechanism operate via motivational process or via associative processes? In addition, we will be concerned with the degree of specificity with which the mediational processes can be evoked and the degree of specificity of their control over behavior. These questions are of considerable theoretical significance to multiprocess theories of learning. Exposition of operational laws and parameter effects will be sought only to the extent that they will contribute to our understanding and/or to the development of better, more efficient paradigms and procedures for exploring the questions. This research is an outgrowth of the principal investigator's (PI's) continuing interest in the mechanisms of instrumental avoidance behavior. It is hoped that PI's research will contribute to our understanding of the basic learning processes and behavioral laws of avoidant behaviors in general, and thus to a better understanding of the role conditioned emotions play in the development, control, and maintenance behaviors. Better understanding of avoidance behavior and the modulating role of event signaling stimuli (CSs) may provide perspective on a variety of clinical phenomena associated with anxiety, for example phobic and compulsive neurotic behaviors.